


Marsbar

by Ian5



Category: OMORI (Video Game)
Genre: Crack, Crack Relationships, Crack Treated Seriously, F/M, Space Pirates, The best ship, all the triggers from omori, hanging specifically, sorry i just sorta forgot to tag this when i uploaded it, spirit mari, very confused sunny
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-16
Updated: 2021-03-12
Packaged: 2021-03-18 17:01:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,801
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29493249
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ian5/pseuds/Ian5
Summary: Mari spends long days floating around in the world behind Sunny, until one day she decides that she's spent too long in the black void below. Mari rises from the ground, only to be pulled into an adventure unexpected.Captain Spaceboy is hot on the trail of one of his longest adversaries. Coming off the tail end of a short marriage, he hasn't managed to truly overcome it, even weeks after those kids had helped him get over the previous breakup. But a sudden stowaway on the ship may just change that.
Relationships: Mari/Captain Spaceboy
Comments: 5
Kudos: 33





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I needed to release this before Matpat does a video and the fandom blows up so that I can make this into an established crack ship.

Mari was drifting aimlessly through headspace; It was her home whenever Sunny was with too many people to hallucinate. It got lonely some days, but she wouldn’t abandon sunny. She decided to drift closer to the surface than usual, as she was getting bored with 4 years of seeing no one but Omori. The sights she saw surprised her, Sunny’s imagination had gotten more vivid. 

She floated higher and higher, looking down on the planet and the ocean she left, until she realized that she was no longer in control of how she floated. She panicked for the first time in 4 years, not knowing if she would be able to get back. Something stringy was pulling at her, throwing her at ascending speed through the sky.

She had to admire the stars, but the beauty of the moment couldn’t stop her from worrying about getting down to her brother. She struggled in vain to get closer to the ground, but found the planet receding at her feet. Was she finally moving on? She didn’t want to go yet! She had Sunny to worry about!

Her thoughts were cut short by an intense purple light. Her eyes took a moment to adjust and she saw that the light was coming from a spaceship. She was being pulled toward it now, which she supposed was better than being pulled into space. She fell into the cargo bay, shocked to collide with the ground for the first time in years.

She was greeted by a comic book character.

No, really. This was Captain Spaceboy, from Kel’s favorite comic book growing up, although he looked a little older. He reached a hand out to her to pick her up off the ground.

“You appear to be in need of assistance, fair stowaway”

“You can see me?”

They talked about the adventures Spaceboy was so keen to discuss, and eventually the conversation drifted to Mari’s origins. Mari dodged the question.

Suddenly, a SPACE PIRATE poked his head into the cargo bay; “Captain, are you forgetting about the spatial anomaly?” 

“What is its status?” he said, gesturing for Mari to follow him.  
“It’s gotten much closer than ever before. It doesn’t appear dangerous, but we need to get rid of it for the safety of Headspace”.

“What anomaly, captain?”.

“For as long as we can remember, we’ve been searching for this anomaly that befuddles our sensors. We finally found a heading that significantly bolstered the signal a few minutes ago. However, I will never abandon a castaway of the stars, so I ordered the good men to halt the ship and send a thread of life your way”

“He actually just used the tractor beam,” echoed from a nearby room.

They pulled up the signal on the big screen, finally able to see it clearly enough to pick it from the chaotic background of Headspace. It was an eye, turned on its side, in an oppressive sea of black.

“Well, that’s ominous,” said Mari.

“Men!”  
“Set heading towards the signal!”

They were all going mad.  
They’d been chasing the signal for a week, and all they’d accomplished was to waste a few thousand clams of starship fuel. It varied almost randomly, sometimes staying in a single direction for hours, often ignoring the ship’s heading entirely, being always 10 degrees starboard, or right below them. To occupy himself, Spaceboy had been showing Mari around the ship, having given her a bunk in the barracks and a level 2 card (the card was met with minor protest from the crew). They were in the cafeteria, eating that day’s special: Space Steak. It was a regular steak with stardust to season, but it was pretty good, Mari thought. Stardust was almost sweet, but it went well with steak, apparently.

She looked back at the Captain himself, seeing him wolf down a steak faster than anyone she’d ever seen except her brother. His eyes had looked more stressed in the past few days than she liked to see on anyone’s face. She’d questioned the crew about it, learning that he had just come out of a bad breakup with a lady named “Sweetheart”. She was shown a picture of Sweetheart by a SPACE PIRATE when the Captain wasn’t looking. It was Ms. Candice. Of course it was.

He finished his steak, and wiped something off his cheek. He met her gaze and she blushed when she realized she’d been staring. He cleared his throat nervously as he recycled his tray. 

“Well, fair maiden!”  
“We shall head to the observatory to gaze upon the stars in pursuit of this anomaly of space”

Mari really liked the observatory at the top of the ship. It was a glass bubble with a ring of telescopes on a circular catwalk. She loved the stars even in life, and seeing them from space was certainly a treat. He took to the telescope next to her and searched the stars.

“Hey, Captain”  
“If you took the telescope opposite, wouldn’t we cover more of the sky?”

The Captain stepped back against the railing, an obvious purple blush on his face. 

“Oh, uh, I thought that two pairs of eyes were better than one,” he says with a nervous timbre.

As he moved away, Mari found herself reaching out to him, before they both noticed and pulled away from each other.

“I can stay if you wa-”  
“I would be honored to stay for a fair maiden such as yourself”, he said, regaining his composure. 

“No it’s fine, go wherever you want there's no need to stay for me I’ll be fine I promise”, spoken at an unnaturally rapid pace.

Without a word, the Captain paced over to the telescope furthest from Mari’s, and made a vain attempt to look like he was scanning the sky. Mari regained composure much faster, but she was still blushing silently at her telescope. They were spared the ensuing awkward silence, although it would have been better than what happened.

The alarm lights came on and they lost sight of anything but the red glow and the stars. The blaring alarm quickly caused the two teenagers to run down the spiral staircase in a panic, brushing against each other on the way down.


	2. Chapter 2

Mari rushed past Captain Spaceboy and nearly fell down the catwalk stairs, coming face to face with a SPACE PIRATE.

“Captain! The reactor is malfunctioning!”   
“We’ve lost power to everything but the engines!”

A look of horror dawned on Spac- the Captain’s face. Mari saw him try to work out what the problem could be. He mumbled offhandedly about meteors and boarders, while the SPACE PIRATE tugged on his sleeve trying to get his attention.  
  
“Captain. I think the SPACE PIRATE is trying to say something,”. The words from Mari snap the Captain out of his speculation; He snapped out of the mumbling and looked to the PIRATE, giving a small nod.  
  
“The reactor is overheating! The heat output spiked two minutes ago and we couldn’t get anyone down to check on it on time!”

“What? The reactor hasn’t shown any sign of problems until now!”

“Uh... the heat output was steadily rising for the past week, but it just jumped to dangerous levels!”   
  
“The past WEEK and nobody told me!?”   


The SPACE PIRATE… blushed? That didn’t seem like the correct reaction to your superior officer yelling in your face to Mari, but she supposed this was normal for the SPACE PIRATES. (It was not). 

"S- sorry, sir. But, well, um… you were so- uh…”

“Well, there’s not any use dwelling on an issue long past. What is required of us?”   


“We need to get to the reactor room.”

  
Captain Spaceboy bore a determined look, striding off confidently with Mari and the SPACE PIRATE following behind. Mari decided that she should get to know the PIRATE that had informed them, if only so she could stop thinking in capital letters. His name was embossed on his lapel in silver: _Lieutenant Richard Lakes_. Mari decided that sending a Lieutenant made sense, with a relatively high rank he seemed more comfortable around the Captain than the average SPACE PIRATE. 

“So, what do you do around here, Lieutenant?”   


“Well, what does a Lieutenant do? I manage the SPACE PIRATES manning the front port lasers. But since the Captain left his communicator with us, I had to come get him. I was the closest PIRATE not stuck behind malfunctioning doors or damaged rooms.”  
  
Mari stopped walking for a moment: “Wait, there’s people stuck!?” Though she had only known the SPACE PIRATES for a week, Mari was protective by nature, and felt responsible for the crew. “We should do something!”  
  
“What are we doing now? If we don’t fix the reactor, we risk more damage to the ship!”   
  


Mari took the time to calm herself down; Even if she didn’t want to hear it, the Lieutenant had a point. So much of the ship depended on getting at least a little power, and that meant that there wasn’t much helping the remaining crew without electricity. After a little rumination, Mari noticed something important from his words.  
  
“The Captain forgot his communicator?”  
  
“Left. He gave it to us to keep safe. He said that “he didn’t want to be interrupted for anything short of an emergency”. A stifled chuckle escaped Lieutenant Richard’s mouth, and for a moment the Captain seemed to quicken his pace, but nothing else came of it.

The remainder of the walk to the reactor bay was largely uneventful, until they reached a closed door. The Captain moved to open it, only to be interrupted by a prompt from the tiny screen.  
  
[ATMOSPHERE LEAK]  
[REAFFIRM COMMAND]  
  
The Captain spoke out: “The portal before us is held shut for a reason, friends. Damage from an unknown source has breached the hull, and the chamber behind has given in to the vast emptiness of space!” Mari found his penchant for flowery language endearing, even if it could be unclear in a situation such as this. She was paying strong attention to the rising tone of his voice, and really felt the rhythm behind the speech! Richard, on the other hand, was fed up with his Captain’s habit of fancy words, even in an emergency! 

“He always talks like this.”   
  
“Really? I’ve seen him drop the act a few times this week.”

The PIRATE’s stifled chuckles from earlier returned in force, him genuinely laughing, to the Captain’s chagrin.   
  
“I haven’t seen him do that since he met S-” 

“WE NEED TO DO SOMETHING ABOUT THE DOOR” Spaceboy cut him off, speaking quickly and blushing bright purple.  
  
“Apologies, the three of us friends must find a safe method to pass through an enclosure with an unusual absence of atmosphere,” the Captain said, the quirk in his speech abruptly intensifying.   
  
“Well, what’s on the other side? I haven’t been down to this part of the ship yet.”  
  
“This, fair stowaway, is the secondary medbay. When our valiant explorers are injured aboard the ship, their issues may be too urgent, or the ship itself damaged to such an extent, that reaching the primary medbay would be entirely impossible. Thus, the secondary medbay exists to treat injuries until they will be properly attended to at the primary medbay.”  
  
Mari asked: “Is there anything that could help us inside?”  
  
The Lieutenant answered her question: “The medbays both have a mobile life support system. We could keep one of us breathing, but said person will be helpless.”  
  
“Allow me to operate the life saving device! As Captain, it is my duty to maintain my crew’s wellbeing, even in the event that I must put my own life on the line.”  
  
“No. As Captain, it is your job to keep the crew alive. If you die here, then you save two people and doom the ship.”  
  
“My duty as the commander of this vessel compels me!”  
  
“Boss, I know you want to look good in front of your crush, but this is important. I operate the machine, and that’s final.”

Mari was conspicuously avoiding the first half of that statement, and so decided to think about the last part. Lieutenant Richard just spoke an order, to the Captain! Was there something between them she was missing? She almost felt a pang of jealousy, only to quash it before she was aware. That was a huge stretch of logic; Why should she care who Spaceb- the Captain was with, anyway!  
  
The Captain warned them back from the door, telling them to take a breath. What they saw on the other side almost made the group gasp away their air. The medbay had a long hole torn in the side, spanning almost the whole wall; There was a staticky black mass undulating through the breach. Mari fell forward onto Captain Spaceboy because of the shock and the air pressure pulling into the room. The two of them were spared the embarrassment of the fall by Lieutenant Richard interrupting with the life support unit.

Richard motioned to the Captain, and the Captain nodded in return.

The Lieutenant turned the Captain onto his back, and hit him with the life support beam. Captain Spaceboy immediately froze, as if paralyzed. He was breathing, but incredibly slowly. Mari felt her typical near pathological concern for others, but also something more that she refused to acknowledge. She reached out to him, not wanting to see him motionless like this, before Richard ran, Captain in tow, to the other door. Suddenly, as Lieutenant Richard reached the doorway, something reached a tendril through the breach, and grabbed the Captain away from the machine. The Captain reflexively held his breath, but he wouldn’t get a new breath any time soon. The tentacles had slammed the door shut, separating Captain and Lieutenant.

Mari almost panicked, kept calm only by a desire to help  _ somehow _ . She ran into the room and grabbed the machine, mentally thanking Sunny for the simplistic controls. She turned the beam to the prone Captain, and calmed slightly when his breathing resumed. She tried to return through the door behind her, only to find that it was being held shut as well. This took a moment to set, her calmly waiting out the air left in her lungs. Then she realized that she might suffocate. This sent her into a spiraling panic, overriding everything but that instinct to protect. She banged on the doors, kicked at tendrils, all futile actions that just wasted air. She was fading out of consciousness, and involuntarily tried to take a breath.

She inhaled, a stale feeling, but certainly not a suffocating one. Trying to clamp down on her breath, she was startled by the feeling of air filling her lungs . She gave another tentative breath, and found herself no longer lacking for air. She was in vacuum, there were still alerts on this side of the medbay doors, but she could breathe. Now neither of them were in immediate danger, and she began to calm down. Taking deep breaths in flagrant violation of the laws of reason, she sat down. She didn’t know how she would open either door, but there were hours left on the life support unit’s portable battery, and Richard would surely get help for the Captain. She idly stroked Spaceboy’s hair, until his face flushed and she realised what she was doing. She was blushing too now, her unnatural breath quickening. She looked away from the Captain and focused on anything but how his arms looked splayed out like that, or how his eyes glittered under the beam or-

She was shaken away from her obvious denial by the unsettling pops and slurps of the tendrils creeping back into the depths of space, somehow audible through a vacuum. As the doors pulled open, a blast of air came from the pressurized hall. It took some effort to stay upright, but she managed to drag the Captain back into the safety of the atmosphere before switching the unit off. She held his wrist, (she told herself she was checking for a pulse) and looked at him, grateful for his safety. Even though she knew he was alive, seeing him shake off the paralysis and sit up straight was wonderful.

“I must have sustained an ill reaction to the rays of life given by the machine, for my eyes deceived. They claimed that you were breathing within the emptiness of space. While you are amazing, I do not believe that is among your many abilities.”   
  
“Yeah, yeah, flirt with your girlfriend later. We have a reactor to fix.”

Mari was a little annoyed at the childish joke, but reminded herself that Lieutenant Richard had a point. As nice as the compliment made her feel, it was time for action, not friendly flattery. Mari got off of the ground, helped the Captain up, and paced forward.

As they forged onward, the group came to a hallway coated in a generous layer of the staticky black stuff from before. There was no nearby hull breach for it to have entered through. The Captain was suspicious of the origin of the gel, but it did not seem to be dangerous. They waded uncomfortably through the substance, despising how stringy it was to touch. Abruptly, Captain Spaceboy slipped on the gel, somewhat odd, as it was sticky and viscous. Nearly simultaneously, Mari slipped identically. They fell towards each other, holding their hands out to catch themselves, only to catch each other into a hug. As they made contact, they suddenly found footing on the static. When they comprehended what they were doing and pulled away from each other, they lost their grip on the floor once more. 

Eventually, to even make progress in the slime, they had to hold hands and brace each other. Captain Spaceboy had suggested it, after the fourth time they fell into each other’s arms: “We seem to need a… ‘partner’ to cross the slime. Would you- er… will you take my hand?” 

When she took the Captain’s hand, he was looking away, and even then his face lit up purple. Mari, for her part, was trying  _ very hard _ to pretend she was enjoying holding hands for protective reasons, like when she took Sunny’s hand on the way home. But she couldn’t ignore the subtle flutter of her heart, and though she denied it even to herself, she was happy to see the blush on Spaceboy’s face. They eventually reached another door, and were interrupted out of their thoughts by a bombastic outburst:  “Lady, and gentleman!” spoke Captain Spaceboy, in a dramatic rising tone.  The portal before you is the entrance to the REACTOR ROOM!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> split off into two chapters, so expect chapter 3 fairly soon


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this did not need to take 19 days to write.  
> sorry.

As they approached the door, though he was uninvolved in the cliche exchange behind him, the Lieutenant found the static easier to walk on. He waved his card over the door, and was met with an annoyed beep. 

“I don’t have clearance to open this door. One of you two can.”  
  
“Wait, why do I have higher clearance than you?”  
  
“Ask the Captain. He gave you a level 2 keycard. That gives you clearance to almost anything on the ship. It’s only a level behind his.” 

Mari was momentarily stunned, wondering why a man she just met would grant her so much trust. The Captain was choking on air, clumsily maneuvering his golden level 1 card to the scanner. Mari resolved to question him on this later. As the door slid open, it revealed an interesting sight. The machine covered in static was labelled clearly as the “primary reactor”, but it seemed to give off an almost rainbow sheen. The whole machine was steaming, black goo boiling off of it. 

“That… does not look good.”  


“Wonderful observation, Captain.” 

The Captain realised that, himself excluded, nobody here understood any of the details of the reactor’s operation. He decided that a cursory explanation would be necessary. 

“The heart of the ship is pumping away at an obscure substance known as ‘clarity’. It, uh, ‘softens’ the rules of the universe in a radius around itself. It cannot change them entirely, but it can nudge them to assist in all manner of tasks. Multiple parts of the ship employ it, not only the reactor; For instance: The vessel’s artificial gravity is passive, the floor simply has much more gravity than it should.” 

The moment the Captain said this, they all felt lighter on their feet. Mari was watching fascinatedly, while Lieutenant Richard listened, if disinterestedly. The two of them came out of the lecture a little clearer on clarity, but clarity was clearly still somewhat unclear to them. As he explained, the black static receded from around the reactor, almost imperceptibly, but the Lieutenant caught it. 

“Captain, when you explained that the static spread away from the reactor!” 

The group was clueless to the meaning of the receding goo, but one of the few things that they could figure out was that they didn’t have the equipment to repair the issue. They could bring backup power online, but the gasoline generator would leave the ship with seriously reduced capabilities. Worse than the electricity was the engines. While they had power, it would be extremely unsafe to use them without the safety mechanisms run by the clarity generator. They would have to use combustion engines, which could take months to return to port. 

“Oh dear,” said Captain Spaceboy.  
  
“I suppose that there’s nothing to do but wait it out.” 

* * *

They spent the next few days patching holes in the hull and trying to determine the nature of the wiry black goop spread around the ship at random. Captain Spaceboy had asked her to meet him in the airlock, and she trusted that he had something important to show her. 

“Welcome, fair stowaway, to the threshold of void and safety. I wish to bring you to experience a spacewalk in a safer context than when we met.” 

He gestured to the atmosphere suits, Mari saw a new one, with a purple outer shell. 

“Some of the PIRATES and I made you a personal space suit. They are all succumbing to space madness without anything to do during the day.” 

Mari looked at the suit once more, seeing the light catch engraved floral patterns and shine off the perfectly polished polymer exterior. Despite being behind a layer of glass, three feet away, she could still see her reflection in it perfectly. Someone had polished it well beyond the realm of practicality, but it was a lovely gesture. 

“I’m surprised the SPACE PIRATES spent so much time polishing something that was just going to dull so fast.” 

The Captain looked at her sheepishly, but never actually said anything. He motioned to the suit, and his expression switched to one of eager anticipation. Mari took the hint, took off her gown, and pulled on the suit, fitting eagerly over the cloth of the scrubs provided to her. Mari was surprised at how well the suit fit, but she supposed they did have her measurements from when they fit her for the scrubs. She looked away when the Captain removed _his_ overwear, and saw him once more when he had his suit on. He was a little clumsier, but she thought that it fit him nicely. She didn’t end up accidentally staring like she sometimes did, but that was largely because spacesuits aren’t very flattering. 

They left the ship in tandem, clinging onto ladders built into the hull. The wing was relatively close to the chosen airlock, but with this being Mari’s first (tangible) spacewalk, the added weight and clunk of the suit left her clumsy, slowly crawling across the surface of the ship. Her and the Captain reached the wing, and it turned out to be a simple broken weld. The Captain pulled out a blowtorch, and got to work. But unfortunately for him, a shudder from the chemical engines they were using pushed the flame of the torch across his arm. He kept calm for Mari’s sake, but he was hurt. The torch broke the seal of his suit and exposed him to the vacuum of space. They rushed back into the ship, and started making their way to the primary medbay. When they walked in, she noticed something odd. Despite the way that injuries worked in headspace, there were also real medical supplies stored around the room. The closest thing to a “medical supply” that Mari had seen since arriving in headspace was a plaster. But these were rolls of gauze and bottles of antiseptic stored on high shelves. She considered for a moment how to question the Captain on the matter without revealing her less than typical origins. 

“What are those… rolls of tape on the shelves for?”  
Captain Spaceboy looked surprised for a moment, but quickly regained composure, “It had slipped my mind that you likely kept to the land until quite recently, this was my mistake. There are some… regions of space... where injuries are more… concerning?” He cringed his way through the sentence, seeming uncomfortable discussing the topic. “When you sustain damage in these locations, it does not reduce your HEART. It _damages_ you, as if you were some common object. Those ‘rolls of tape’ are gauze. Gauze’s purpose is to assist with the blocking of bleeding. Bleeding is where… you lose blood, through a wound...” 

He sounded personally uncomfortable now and Mari decided that she would spare him from talking about it. “Eugh. I get the idea, you can stop now.” 

The Captain was apologetic, worried that he’s disgusted Mari, but he still seemed to be glad to move away from the subject. Mari was worried to learn that the Captain had been somewhere where real injuries applied, she would worry for his safety in any of the places he could have been talking about. White Space wasn’t designed for his ilk, and Black Space was… not a good place to be. She didn’t know of any other places in Sunny’s mind, but she hoped that she was just unaware of a _safer_ place for the Captain where injuries worked like normal. She found herself squeezing his hand in worry, before she saw the familiar purple blush form in his ears and pulled her hand away. 

The SPACE NURSE at the desk spoke up: “Captain, it’s your turn.” 

Mari was sad to see him go, still denying that there was _anything_ but a platonic relationship between them. The Captain walked into the room and returned shortly with his HEART topped up. With Mari in tow he stepped back out into the hall, making his way towards the bridge. They watched the sky ahead of them, watching for any potential danger, but at the speeds of chemical engines there wasn’t really anything to worry them. They eventually left their post, having the assurance of the SPACE PIRATES that, “We got this, boss!”. Mari and the Captain were wandering the decks of the ship aimlessly, enjoying each other’s company, before they came across the storage room. The Captain piped up, seemingly excited about something. “We should spend a moment of our time enjoying the storage room!” 

“What’s so great about the storage room?”  


“The storage room is the only area of this vessel with an atmosphere, and yet no gravity! It’s such an exhilarating feeling to drift about unrestrained by a cumbersome atmosphere suit.” 

The Captain almost reached to guide her by the hand, but seemed to reconsider before she got the opportunity to take it. He motioned to the door and it opened. He walked into the unassuming warehouse and pushed off with his right leg. As he followed through with a flourish, Mari watched his posture change entirely. His legs curled in slightly, and he turned his head up to follow his motion. He threw his arms out to his sides and used the air in the room to control his path, doing a little spin in the air. 

Mari, watching from the doorway, was captivated. Seeing him in his element, she watched his movements and focused on the way he seemed to almost flow from one motion to another. He was clearly enjoying himself the most out of any time she’d seen him, not even noticing Mari staring. She thought to herself: “That looks like fun. I don’t think I’d be able to do _that_ , though. He really does seem to love this.” After that, something she’d thought without admitting it since she met him finally bubbled to the surface, “Damn. He’s hot.” After this thought, she immediately blushed at her own bluntness. She shouldn’t think like that! She was thinking of the Captain here! Was it okay for a crew member to even feel like this about the leader of the PIRATES? Then, she mentally kicked herself when she realised something even more important. Hero! She was _in a relationship_ , she shouldn’t be thinking like this about anyone else! 

Captain Spaceboy noticed the girl hadn’t joined him in the storage room and slowed his path through the air. “What are you waiting for! This is great!”. With his words, Mari’s blush only intensified, but she decided that staying in the hallway would be more suspicious than trying to hide her face. She couldn’t let the Captain figure this out! He’d been _so nice_ to her, she didn’t want to make him uncomfortable with some crazy crush! He’d just come out of a _divorce_ and here she was thinking about those _legs_ and that _hair_ and- She gathered her thoughts, deciding that it would only make her look more suspicious to stand still in the doorway for longer. She took a step, then another, and slipped, doing an involuntary cartwheel through the air. She bumped into a crate and steadied herself, before pushing down with her arms and rising into the air. 

She understood why Spaceboy was so enamoured with this room. Even with her poor control, she felt free in this room like their spacewalk couldn’t deliver. Free from the confines of a helmet, her hair floated around her head, pulling apart into disparate strands. The Captain was drifting around with purpose, doing flips and quickly darting around the room. His eyes fell on her awkward movements through the room and, comfortable in weightlessness, he found the confidence to help her. 

Captain Spaceboy swam toward Mari, feeling the air rush through his hair. “Were you in need of assistance, fair stowaway?” Mari was still floundering in the air, but she didn’t want to do anything to inconvenience her host. She was taking up space without doing anything in return, and now this person she barely knew was dropping everything to help her. She needed to do this on her own, she wasn’t going to ruin what was seemingly the Captain’s favorite activity on the ship. She renewed her resolve, and pushed off the ground. 

She flew straight into the ceiling. 

“Okay… maybe I could use the help.” 

She drifted slowly away from the steel surface, only to steady once more when the Captain grabbed her shoulders. “The first step to mastering your control within microgravity is managing your center of mass. You must maintain focus on your distribution of weight. You do not need perfect control, but you must attain an intuition for your center of mass.” Mari focused on her weight, feeling her own movements, but she felt the little twitches of her fingers and the tremble of her arms, and knew she wasn’t _really_ keeping track of her balance. Despite her failure, the Captain spoke on: “You are keeping a better watch of your center of mass than I expected, even from you! The second aspect of atmospheric microgravity movement is understanding of the dynamics of movement. An apt analogy can be made to swimming, but there is one vital difference: Atmosphere is universally thinner than water. You have to put your whole body into an undulating motion, or you will make little progress.” When he finished his spiel, he demonstrated; His arms gently at his sides, his legs held together, he moved in a graceful undulating motion, as if he were an eel. 

Mari watched in awe, seeing the coordination that every muscle in his body was showing. She watched him do a lap around the room, without a care in the world. When he got back to her, she finally noticed her own lingering eyes, she pulled away and hastily made to attempt a display of her own. She pushed off the wall and focused on her fingers. She tried to mimic those graceful motions that she had seen from the Captain, but she was acutely aware of how the muscles in his fingers had complimented his back and how his calves had balanced the slightest motion of his head and how his arms were mirrors of each other and- 

Mari locked up in the air, trying to focus on everything at once, only to feel a hand on her shoulder. “Do you… want help?” Mari felt bad about imposing like this, but it would be more awkward to deny him now. He gave her some pointers. She needed to keep her legs together, and to focus on her arms more than her fingers. She still found herself too occupied with the minute balances of her fingers and head, and she couldn’t keep attention on her legs. She floated off in a random direction once more, only to be shocked by a grip on her calves. 

“No, put your legs like _this!_ ”  
  
Captain Spaceboy bent her knees and brought her legs together, only to realize what he’d just done and pull away like her legs were fire. “Oh! I apologize gr- I’m sor- uh… I didn-” Spaceboy sighed, and he seemed to collect himself. “I… am sorry, fair stowaway, I did… not mean to- er-” 

Mari was pretty sure she knew what his problem was, and having recovered from the initial embarrassment of having the Captain grab her legs, she worried about him. “No, its okay, I know you didn’t mean to. Sometimes, we do things in anger that aren’t our fault. Really, I should have been flying better, anyway.” Mari felt awful, she had just ruined any chance he had of enjoying his time in the storage room, and there was no-one to blame but her. Regardless of if her self deprecation was valid, she wasn’t able to say that she was the only thing ruining it anymore. Lieutenant Richard burst into the room: “Captain, something is happening outside the ship! The scanners are baffled, but you can just look out the window and see something’s wrong!” 

They rushed out to the bridge and looked through the window, seeing purple space fade in hue and watching stars wink out, one by one. 


End file.
